Transcript

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>> Final campaigning in the Netherlands, as the Dutch head to the polls in a vote charged with racial tension. Sylvana Simons has been a familiar on Dutch television, but she now has her own party. The career change driven by the racist abuse and harassment she's faced. The cofounder of the party Artikel 1 says she's never felt safe enough to campaign in public.

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>> I don't think she would have received these threats ten years ago. The Netherlands was known as a fairly tolerant country and in the last ten years, things have changed dramatically.>> Attacks on her have highlighted a rise in tension. Frontrunner Geert Wilders' anti-immigration, anti-Islam populist message strikes a chord here.

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He's been likened to Donald Trump. I'm Reuters' Emily Wither in Amsterdam. The question of Dutch national identity is at the heart of this election. And as populism sweeps across the western world. The prime minister, Mark Rutte, is calling on voters to stop the wrong kind of populism at the polls.

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Katinka admires Wilders. She says he addresses the Netherlands' real issues.>> I think Wilders is now saying things that have very long, well, not been appropriate to say.>> Is he saying things that people have been too afraid to say?>> Yes, yes, if I were to say them then I would also be a fascist.

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So everybody kind of shuts up and it becomes an elephant in the room.>> The Netherlands has a reputation as being a liberal, tolerant nation. Across town, argues that could be about to change. The son of Moroccan immigrants and a former lawmaker, he used to face Wilders in Parliament.

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He's also openly gay, a community Wilders claims to protect.>> It took me a long time to come out as a gay man. And partly because I was afraid of how other Muslims will treat me, how my family would treat me.>> And politicians like Wilders, they use that as a stick to hit against Muslims, against immigrants, against Islam.

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>> First Brexit, then Trump's triumph. What happens here could be a sign of what's to come.